Forest and Stream. 



A Weekly Journal of the Rod and Gun. 



Terms, $4 A Yeak. 10 Cts. a Copt. I 

 Sis Months, $3. j 



NEW YORK, SATURDAY, MARCH 3, 1894. 



( VOL. XLII.— No. 9. 



( No. 318 Broadway, New York. 



CONTENTS. 



Editorial. 



Troops and Forests. 

 Opportunity. 

 Snap Shots. 



The Sportsman Tourist* 



Cape Cod Way. 



A Story of 1864. 



The Soul of Shooting. 



Danvis Folks.— xxra. 



Fighting for a Deer Track. 



No Love Like the Old Love. 



Natural History. 



Snakes and "Whoppers." 

 Capt. Gallup on Snakes. 

 Caribou Habits. 

 Lynxes. 



Game Bag and Gun. 



Giving the Alarm. 

 Stop fiie Sale of Game. 

 "Hunting Without a Dog." 

 The Adirondack Deer. 

 Chicago and the West. 



Sea and River Fishing. 



Angling Notes. 

 Portage Lake. 

 Boston Budget. 

 Gilbert Trout Bill. 



The Kennel. 



New York Dog Show. 

 Club Meetings. 

 Dog Chat. 



Answers to Correspondents. 

 Canoeing. 



Anything to Growl. 



What Can We Do for Racing. 



A. C. A. Meet of 1894. 



News Notes. 

 Yachting. 



Board, Fins and Lateral Strain. 



Royal Aquarium Yachting Exhi- 

 bition. 



News Notes. 

 Rifle Range and Gallery. 



Zettler Club Team Tournament. 



Golden Gate Riflemen. 



Jersevnien at the Targets. 



Club Doings. 

 Trap Shooting. 



Drivers and Twisters. 



Hillsides Like the McMurchy 



Rochester Rod and Gnn Club. 

 First F. N. Y. League Tourna- 

 ment. 



Matches and Meetings. 

 Answers to Queries. 



For Prospectus and Advertising Rates see Page viii. 



The Forest and Stream is put to press 

 on Tuesdays. Correspondence intended for 

 publication should reach us by Mondays and 

 as much earlier as may be practicable. 



TROOPS FOR THE FORESTS. 



Attention has frequently been called to the fact that 

 our National Parks and the recently established forest 

 reservations are entirely without that protection which 

 is essential to their preservation and to the accomplish- 

 ment of the useful purposes for which they have been 

 established. This is something which has been too long 

 neglected, and which should now have the attention of 

 Congress. 



It is true that in the Yellowstone, the Yosemite, the 

 Grant and the Sequoia National Parks, troops have been 

 employed to patrol the reservations and to protect the 

 forests, and in a measure the game, though recently 

 doubt has been thrown on the legality of the use of 

 troops for these purposes in the three last mentioned. 

 But the forest reservations, embracing nearly 12,000,000 

 acres of land are now, as they have always been, en- 

 tirely without guardians. 



It is to be assumed that when Congress passed the act 

 of March 3, 1891, under which these forest reservations 

 were set apart, it meant to give the opportunity for just 

 such action as was taken by the President when he issued 

 the proclamations that established the reservations; but 

 it must be evident to any intelligence that the mere 

 formal announcement that these tracts of land are reserved 

 is entirely without practical meaning. In order that such 

 reservations and such parks shall be of actual benefit to 

 the country, it is necessary that they shall be in fact what 

 they are in name, and shall really be protected from 

 incursions by trespassers and from fire; and this can be 

 done only by the presence on these lands of government 

 officials who shall see that the law is obeyed. These 

 national parks and forest reservations are all of them sit- 

 uated in the Rocky Mountains or in the mountains of the 

 farther West. They are more or less timbered with con- 

 iferous trees, and are thus especially exposed to the danger 

 of fire, burning when once aflame, like so much gun- 

 powder. Besides this they are subject to constant invasion 

 by timber thieves, who cut the growing trees; by sheep 

 men, whose flocks destroy the young seedlings; and by 

 hunters, campers and picnickers, whose fires frequently 

 kindle conflagrations that are far beyond the power of 

 human hand to hold in check. Thus the forest reserva- 

 tions, while they give pleasure and profit to a few selfish 

 persons, who often entirely disregard the rights which the 

 public have in them, at present accomplish nothing for 

 the general good. 



In the recently published book of the Boone and 

 Crockett Club the subject of the Federal ownership of 

 the timber and game on these forest reservations is con- 

 cisely treated in the following words: "The timber and 

 the game ought to be made the absolute property of the 

 Government, and it should be constituted a punishable 

 offense to appropriate such property within the limits of 

 the reservation. The game and the timber should be 

 regarded as Government property, just as are the mules 



and the cord wood at an army post. If it is a crime to 

 take the latter it should be a crime to plunder a forest 

 reservation." 



A law providing for the systematic protection of all 

 these parks and forest reservations should be enacted 

 without further delay. Such an act should formally place 

 all these parks and forest reservations under the authority 

 of the Secretary of the Interior, giving him full power to 

 make such rules and regulations as he shall deem needful 

 for their government and control. 



It should formally declare the timber, the forests and 

 the wild game and fish, now or hereafter to be found 

 within these reservations, to be the property of the United 

 States, and should make the cutting of timber and the 

 killing of game or fish, except under the regulations pres- 

 cribed by the Secretary of the Interior — crimes. 



It should provide and set in operation that process of 

 law (without which no man under our form of govern- 

 ment can be adjudged guilty of a crime), by which tres- 

 passers, timber thieves, game butchers, and those who 

 wilfully or carelessly fire the forest — all those who violate 

 the regulations or commit misdemeanors or crimes— shall 

 be tried; and should establish the necessary machinery of 

 justice for such trial and for punishment. 



It should authorize the Secretary of War to furnish to 

 the Secretary of the Interior on his request such troops 

 as may be necessary for the purpose of efficiently patrol- 

 ling and permanently protecting each of the reserva- 

 tions. The excellent protective work done in recent years 

 by the troops in the Yellowstone Park, has thoroughly 

 established the efficiency of the soldiers as guardians of 

 our National reservations. 



Such an act as we have indicated should be broad and 

 complete, and after it has been drawn it should be sub- 

 mitted to the criticism of those best acquainted with the 

 Western country and with the problems of forest and 

 game preservation, which are inseparably connected with 

 the subject. There is perhaps no one act which would 

 confer on the mountainous country of the West, and the 

 dry plains which lie at the foot of those mountain ranges, 

 so much material benefit as a wisely drawn law which 

 would provide broadly and fully for the efficient protec- 

 tion of our national parks and forest reservations. Only 

 those who are familiar with the arid West and with the 

 changes which take place in that dry region when once 

 water is put upon the thirsty soil, can appreciate how 

 vastly the material prosperity of the inhabitants of a 

 great section of our country would be increased by the 

 passage of a suitable act of this nature. 



Swisher, Castro, Parmer, Greer, Deaf Smith, Pan 

 dall, Armstrong, Donley, Collingsworth, Gray, Car- 

 son, Potter, Hutchinson, Hartley, Moore, Roberts, Hemp- 

 hill, Lipscomb, Ochiltree, Hansford, Sherman, Hardeman, 

 Dallam, Cass, San Jacinto, Camp, Dimmit, Kinney, Cam- 

 eron, Jackson, Kaufman, the unorganized county of 

 Zavala, Angelina, Walker, Trinity, Panola, Jack, Young, 

 Fannin, Delta, Hopkins, Gonzales, Morris, Waller, Tyler, 

 Newton, Burnet, Karnes, Atascosa and Bell counties are 

 exempt from the provisions of Art. 426 of the game law, 

 which is the section relating to deer, the counties of 

 Bowie, Nacogdoches, Hill and Rusk are exempted from 

 Arts. 427, 428 and 429 only, and not from 426. It is all 

 simple enough, when as a plain sportsman or as a Gov- 

 ernor and sportsman combined you have memorized it; 

 and every one in Texas has abundant time to commit the 

 law to memory, for they change the list of counties only 

 once in two years. 



The other explanation which the Governor is reported 

 to have given is that he was arrested out of spite, because 

 of the Lake Surprise affair. This excuse is no better than 

 the other, for it is to say that the Texas deer law is 

 enforced only as a spite measure. If this be true, it indi- 

 cates a condition of game lawlessness, of which Mr. Hogg 

 as Governor and Mr. Hogg as sportsman should be 

 ashamed, and to the correction of which as executive 

 and sportsman he should address himself without delay. 



Mr. Hogg is just now at odds with the sportsmen of 

 his State. He may regain their regard and earn their 

 lasting gratitude if he will set out to accomplish these 

 two things — first, the simplification of the game laws so 

 that all may know what they are; and second, then- 

 wholesome enforcement not as spite measures, but as wise 

 provisions to be observed and respected by all alike for 

 the general good. It is a great opportunity. 



SNAP SHOTS. 



GOVERNOR HOGG'S OPPORTUNITY. 



Governor Hogg, of Texas, has been given some notori- 

 ety recently because of alleged connivance in the unlaw- 

 ful patenting of a famous canvasback resort — Lake 

 Surprise — to a Galveston man named Moody. The 

 patentee claimed that he wanted the lake for a rice farm. 

 The sportsmen of Texas declare that he wanted it for the 

 ducks, which are shot for market, the proceeds going in 

 part to Moody. The Governor has been criticised for 

 winking at the transaction; it is said that he should see 

 to it that the patent of Lake Surprise to a market-hunting 

 "combine" be rescinded. 



Just now Mr. Hogg finds himself in fresh trouble with 

 Texan sportsmen for having killed a deer out of season. 

 The deed was committeed in Nacogdoches county. The 

 press dispatches say that the Governor has been arrested, 

 and has declared his intention of settling with alacrity, if 

 he has violated the statute. 



If the papers report him correctly, he has put forth 

 two explanations of his predicament, neither of which 

 becomes the chief executive of the State of Texas. One 

 of these explanations is that he did not know that deer 

 were protected in Nacogdoches county. This is a poor 

 enough excuse. Mr. Hogg is not only a Governor, but he 

 claims to be a sportsman as well, and in either one or the 

 other capacity, if not in both, he should have known 

 that while Cherokee, Shelby, Franklin, Rockwall, Hop- 

 kins, Brazos, Williamson, Coryell, Brown, Mills, Co- 

 manche, Runnels, Cooke, Wise, Madison, Clay, Jack and 

 the unorganized counties attached to the same for judi- 

 cial purposes, Freestone, Stephens, Eastland, Palo Pinto, 

 Polk, Throckmorton, Callahan, Taylor, Jones, Kent, 

 Garza, Lynn, Terry, Yoakum, Trinity, Archer, Wichita, 

 Wheeler, Oldham, King, Dickens, Crosby, Wilbarger, 

 Childress, Lubbock, Hockley, Cochran, Bailey, Lamb, 

 Lamar, Hale, Floyd, Motley, Cottle, Hall, Briscoe, 



If the marketing of game could be stopped, the result 

 would be not only to diminish the legitimate drain on the 

 game supply in the open season and by lawful methods 

 but as well to cut off a large share of the illicit pursuit of 

 game. For as a matter of fact, experience demonstrates 

 that a vast proportion of the unlawful shooting is that 

 which is done to feed the markets. A resident of Long 

 Island was complaining the other day of the absence of 

 wildfowl from the Island waters this season; and now it 

 develops that the reason for this is that the bays have been 

 fire-hunted systematically by market-shooters, for the 

 Brooklyn and New York trade. 



An egg of the great auk was sold in London last week 

 for $1,500. If your great-grandfather had robbed a few 

 nests of this fowl and stored the eggs in the attic, he 

 would have performed a distinguished service for his 

 posterity. 



Mr. Austin Corbin has some wild boars in his New 

 Hampshire preserve; but we understand that he is not 

 particularly enthusiastic over them. There is no special 

 sense in importing wild boars into this country. The 

 brutes are all well enough perhaps for Algerian pig-stick- 

 ers, but they would not make a desirable addition to the 

 game supply of this great and glorious land of freedom. 

 As for wild hogs, there is a very creditable native supply; 

 and those who are ambitious in that direction may find 

 the game in Tennessee mountains, Louisiana swa^paps and 

 California tule lands, not to mention Texas with its 

 peccaries. Fur and feathers, the more the better, but we 

 may well spare the bristles. 



Mr. Gilbert, the trout culturist, has succeeded in put- 

 ting his bill through the Massachusetts Legislature again 

 this winter, and it threatens to become a law unless Gov. 

 Greenhalge shall follow the wise precedent of Gov. Rus- 

 sell and give it his veto. The measure is to permit the 

 sale of cultivated trout in certain months of the close 

 season for the capture or sale of wild trout. Mr. Gilbert 

 bases his argument for the bill upon the fact that he can 

 raise trout in his own private ponds and market them at 

 a profit in the close season, that to forbid this is to work 

 hardship to him, that the industry of trout breeding is 

 one which should be encouraged, and that the marketing 

 of artificially reared fish will not endanger the native 

 supply of wild trout in the waters of the Commonwealth. 

 The personal advantage of the measure to Mr. Gilbert 

 must be conceded. But on the other hand all experience 

 teaches the futility of attempting to preserve fish or game 



